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Probably the greatest aspect of brewing and beer in general is how accessible every facet of the field really is. If you’d like to try to recreate your favorite IPA at home, there’s a decent chance the recipe will be on the brewery’s website, or at least on a brewing forum like HomebrewTalk.com. Even at the commercial level, one will often find local breweries working together to create a collaborative beer or hosting a homebrew competition for the local community. These competitions are often entered by homebrewers as a way to gain some constructive criticism and attempt to take their brewing to the next level. But again, they are remarkably accessible to anyone with a couple extra 12 oz. bottles of homebrew and the five dollar entry fee. The fee will vary of course, but the point is, competitions are very ubiquitous and very easy to enter. Here are a few resources to get you started on entering your local competition.

Jim Koch of Boston Beer believes the craft beer industry will fail or succeed together

“As a craft brewer in America, after 27 years we’ve finally gotten to 1 percent market share, so my competition is not craft brewers because we’re all going to succeed or fail together. My real competition is ignorance and apathy. I’m about creating an appreciation of good beer, educating people about it and teaching them to treat it with respect. If I can do those things, I can succeed.” -Jim Koch